A book review: 'Girls of Riyadh'

REVIEW: 'THE GIRLS OF RIYADH'
RAJAA ALSANEA

The book 'Girls of Riyadh' has been innovatively written by a 25 year old girl, Rajaa Alsanea. The book revolves around a clique of four best friends who reside in Riyadh. These girls who have all the characteristics of an epicurean belong to the 'velvet class' of the city and enjoy the material luxuries that they can easily afford like living in palatial houses, wearing branded clothes and traveling to exotic locales but the book basically reveals their convoluted love life. It also tells about the impediments they face in their relationships, mostly caused by the conservative and critical thinking of their society. The book embodies the thoughts, ideas and desires of women behind the veils. It condemns the double standards and gender disparity that dominates the Saudi society.

This story is narrated by an unidentified writer who knows the life of these four girls and writes about them weekly in the form of emails that are sent out to all the users of the internet in Saudi Arabia. Every week the anonymous writer who is determined not to disclose her identity, apprises the readers about the kind of mixed response that she receives, replies to them and continues with the tale of the four girls who exemplify the adversities faced by Saudi women, most of whom find themselves constricted in shackles. The author uses inspiring yet pertinent quotes from playwrights, famous authors and singers in the beginning of most emails which whets the readers' appetite to read further.

The protagonists of the book are very realistic. Sadeem is a petite girl who is around 20 years old and is usually tangled in topsy-turvy situations. She is the one who suffers many heartbreaks and her quest for finding herself a suitable match throughout the book is quiet interesting. Lamees possess a little more freedom than her other peeps due to her influential and knowledgeable parents. She is career oriented and seldom faces hardships. From all the girls Lamees was the one I found the least interesting because in her life the quantity of drama that prevails is comparatively less than the one that can be found in oodles in her friends' stories. Gamrah is someone who dithers in almost every phase of her life, be it in marriage, raising a child or living with her parents as a divorcee, she is constantly in fear of being ostracized. The most delightful character for me was Michelle who is very different from her friends in every way. This liberal, half-American girl compromises on nothing, she never settles for anything less than perfect. She is much more independent than her friends who she thinks are responsible for their own bad state of affairs. Michelle has a different outlook on everything and more than often her perceptions and view points clash with her friends'.

Like many other reviewers of the book, I didn't find it amazingly revelatory, for the sole reason that the books depicts the emotions of young girls who have the same feelings, urges and desires like any other young girl of their age around the world. They fall in love, they do sneaky things, they get betrayed, they suffer heartbreaks, they despise the system and they have a strong urge to retaliate, it's all the same. The only difference is that in this book the girls do all this in a different society. The book has been banned in Saudi Arabia for its explicit albeit true details of the lives of the Saudi women. If this review triggers your curiosity and interest and you are looking for a light read then get a hold of it and read to find out what route the lives of these four girls take. The cover of the book would be compelling enough for most people to entice them into reading it, but as they say: 'Don't judge a book by it's cover' so for those who are seeking for more deeper information and a serious read about Saudi Arabia, I reckon that you have better options to choose from.